EasyImg, to mention at first, is a very different kind of web service which can be very powerful under the creative hands.

It is a highly customizable web-based graphics engine that enables anyone to insert "instantly created custom images" to their websites.

How it works?

EasyImg works by sending a formatted query to the service as the source of an image. An example will describe it better:

<img src="http://images.easyimg.com/fd592fce/h-60/w-480/bw-2/r-15/bc-e0dede/fc-fcfbdc/c-fc2671/font-Tahoma/size-30/banner.png?text=WRD Test Banner" />

will return:

 where:

• fd592fce = is the token for my account
• h-60 = height is 60px
• w-480 = width is 480px
• bw-2 = border width is 2px
• and you can possibly guess the rest easily..

Besides the standard image properties, it is possible to use various fonts, rotate the final image, add gradients & more.

And, as it doesn’t use any JavaScript or CSS hack, it is totally compatible with any browser.

EasyImg can be set to re-create the image every time it is called or use caching for faster usage.

Also, it is not a must to host every image generated at the system. They can be downloaded as a single ZIP file anytime.

Where can I use it?

Primarily, it is a great fit to be used in websites where images must/can be customized like:

• users customizing the look & feel of their accounts (you may need to create rounded corners with different colors)
• usage of rotation
• usage of custom fonts
• no image editing software (ideal for customers who are not into webdesign but want to update the look of websites – can be integrated into CMSs)

And, it is a perfect fit for special cases like dynamic barcode generation (just use the barcode font).

EasyImg comes with different plans where a free one exists as well.

You can see how powerful it can be with the options it offers & from the samples. Or, you can play with the online canvas.

P.S. This post is a sponsored review.

Paymo, a multilanguage & web-based time-tracking / invoicing application is giving away "20 Lifetime Invoice Accounts" (normally $9.99/month) to WebResourcesDepot users. Before any more details on that:

What is Paymo?

Paymo is a very functional application for anyone (whether you're a "one-man-army" or a "team that works on same/different projects") for tracking the time that is worked on projects>tasks, analyze that time & bill your clients accordingly.

How does it work?

Users:

First thing to do is creating users (the application is totally free for up to 3 users). Considering every user may have different conditions, it is possible to set variables like workday length, timezone, week start day, etc for every user.

Clients:

It is necessary to define clients (this can be yourself for your own projects) in order to create the projects. This info is also used in the invoices.

Projects > Tasks:

That's the heart of the application, yet very simple to define & use.

Projects can be created by defining the details like: the client, budget hours, price per hour & users that will work in the project. After that, tasks can be created which are the main things that the application tracks the time of.

Read the rest of this entry »

Normally, we cannot schedule everything we’re going to do & at the end of the day we end up asking: "where did my time go?".

LogMyTask is a web-based time tracking application which is totally focused to finding that out with no extras that makes it easier to adapt & use.

It can be used by only one user or collaboratively with a group of users & even different teams.

The usage of the application is very straightforward:

• admin user creates teams
• invites users to the teams by simply providing their e-mails
• users can start creating their tasks

The application works in almost real-time with very few refreshes. When a user adds/updates a task, the other users instantly see them.

With just a click, it is possible to see "what, when & how long every user worked on" in a calendar view. And, if needed, edit the past data.

Conclusion:

The application is so easy to use (like the Twitter for time tracking) & very functional for individuals to teams who want to get the most out of their time.

LogMyTask is currently in beta status & totally free to use. After the beta, there will still be a free plan offered.

P.S. This post is a sponsored review.

Last week, a post at WRD was announcing the giveaway of 5 Fanurio time tracking & billing software licenses ($59 value / license). The winners are selected & can be found at the bottom of the post. But before that, to remind:

What is Fanurio?

Fanurio is a beautiful software with an intuitive interface for easily tracking time that is spent on projects & billing them accordingly.

It is possible to define projects & sub-tasks. Then, the time worked on the projects can be tracked manually or with the help of a timer.

For teams, everyone can install Fanurio to their computers, track the time and export/import reports easily.

Create the invoices

From the moment you get a new contract until you are paid in full, Fanurio offers you the right tools to manage and bill all your work down to the penny.

It covers almost any billing feature you may need like rounding time "up, down or to the nearest specified interval" or applying discounts & more.

Analyze the performance

Fanurio helps analyzing the perfomance with the reports it generates:

• payments: see all your open, un-paid invoices
• timesheet: time recorded on a certain period, by project or client
• project reports: howmuch money you made, howmuch money is unpaid, etc.

Also, reports can be exported to CSV or Excel for further analysis.

Fanurio works on Windows, Mac or Linux & doesn’t require purchasing new licenses when switching OSs.

And, the winners:

Here they are:

• Matt (comment #75715)
• Pritish Nandi (comment #75810)
• christian (comment #77066)
• GeeniUss (comment #75715)
• paul rostorp (comment #76381)

Congratulations to the winners and thanks to everyone for joining this giveaway.

Fanurio, a flexible time tracking & billing software which is specially built for freelancers in mind, is giving away 5 licenses ($59 value / license) to WebResourcesDepot readers.

Details on "how to winning them" can be found at the bottom of the post. But before that:

What is Fanurio?

It is a well-thought software, with an intuitive interface, which can track the time that is worked on a project & help billing that job with almost no effort.

Track your time

The software enables you to define projects & sub-tasks. Then, the time worked on the projects can be tracked manually or with the help of a timer which also has a few reminders to help you start, resume or stop it automatically.

For teams, everyone can install Fanurio to their computers, track the time and export/import reports easily.

Create the invoices

From the moment you get a new contract until you are paid in full, Fanurio offers you the right tools to manage and bill all your work down to the penny.

It covers almost any billing feature you may need like:

• when billing by the hour, you can round time "up, down or to the nearest specified interval"
• apply discounts as a percentage or as a fixed value
• price and units can be entered using two or three decimals for a better accuracy
• for working with foreign clients, it can handle multiple currencies

If you are subcontracting some of your work or if you are reselling some goods, you can also enter the purchase cost to know exactly how much you are making. Also, any other item like expenses for a project can be mentioned as well.

Unlimited number of taxes can be defined & certain clients can be marked as tax exempt.

You can see a snapshot of the invoices (which ones are paid, unpaid or overdue) instantly. For unpaid invoices, you can see how much was paid and the remaining balance.

Any type of custom invoice designs can be created & if desired, it can auto-number the invoices when creating them.

Analyze the performance

Fanurio helps analyzing the perfomance with the reports it generates:

• timesheet: time recorded on a certain period, by project or client
• project reports: howmuch money you made, howmuch money is unpaid, etc.

Also, reports can be exported to CSV or Excel for further analysis.

Fanurio works on Windows, Mac or Linux & doesn’t require purchasing new licenses when switching OSs.

How to win the licenses?

Commenting to this post is enough to join the giveaway & winners will be selected randomly via the query below on 23 September 2009 (1 week later).

SELECT * FROM wp_comments WHERE comment_post_id=1166 AND comment_approved=1 AND comment_type='' GROUP BY comment_author_email ORDER BY RAND() LIMIT 5

Good luck to all : ).

P.S. You can evaluate the product by downloading the trial version.

Kentico CMS is a powerful, flexible & complete content management system that is built with ASP.NET.

It has various modules that make building any type of website possible from blogs to e-commerce or wikis to social networking.

The application comes with an easy-to-use WYSIWYG editor for creating/editing the content.

One of the unique features Kentico offers is the worklow management. It allows you to control the process of content creation & modifications by creating custom approval steps (like proofreading, editing, approval, etc.).

Kentico is multilingual & can manage multiple websites from the same administrator panel.

It has an API that allows you to script any Kentico CMS operation (like creating a new document, user or even the whole web site) which is great for integrations with any 3rd party software. On the other hand, with the modules integrated, there is almost no extra function needed. Here are all the modules it offers:

• Blogs
• Booking system
• Content Rating
• Content Staging
• E-commerce
• Event calendar
• Forums
• Friends
• Geomapping
• Groups
• Image Gallery
• Media Library
• Message Boards
• Messaging
• Newsletter
• On-line Forms
• Polls
• Reporting
• Taxonomy
• Wiki
• Web Farm Support
• Web Analytics

which simply show what the application is capable of.

And, these are not all it has. Kentico generates SEO-friendly URLs, has full-text search support, a powerful role-based security system & much more..

Besides the paid versions, it offers a limited free version which is ideal for smaller websites. The free edition have no time limitation & can be used even for commercial purposes with no additional cost. It can be downloaded from here.

Kentico CMS is reliable and stable product & I didn’t came to any bug. But if that occurs, the company promises to fix it within 7 working days, furthermore they plant a tree in the name of the client who finds the bug. You can read more about this interesting initiative here.

The product can be evaluated by downloading the TRIAL or FREE editions. Other way is to use the Virtual Lab service which allows you to test-drive Kentico CMS on-line, without installing anything on your local PC.

P.S. This post is a sponsored review.

Last week, the 1000th post of WRD was announcing a huge giveaway of products/services that web designers & developers would love.

One week later, today, the winners are selected and they are announced at the bottom of the post.

But before that, lets remember the products/services which made this huge giveaway (32 products) possible (listed alphabetically):

• activeCollab
• CAZE
• CometChat
• Flowplayer
• MachForm
• MailChimp
• Monoslideshow
• Navicat
  
• Pingdom
• PointBanner
• SSLmatic

Read the rest of this entry »

BigCommerce is an easy-to-use hosted e-commerce software which makes your store up & running so quickly.

It can be totally customized as you have full access to HTML/CSS via FTP & there are 50+ ready-to-use store designs that can be applied with few clicks.

BigCommerce is integrated with almost every payment, shipping & accounting system you can think of. Optionally, it offers its own merchant account system with under-the-market rates.

The software is fully optimized for SEO from valid W3C templates to automatically generated sitemap XML file & SEO-firendly links.

Besides the products, it is possible to create & share any content (like return policies, promotion details) with its CMS functionality.

The software offers a quality usability experience to customers with features like:

• one-click adding to cart
• ability to compare products
• tracking orders
• wishlists (public & private)
• single page & guest checkout
• powerful search system (suggestions, filtering by price/availability, etc.)
• & many more

It has everything to market the products easily like

• trackable coupon codes
• bulk discounts per product
• ability to create custom discount rules
• free shipping for purchases over $x
• affiliate system
• & more..

As BigCommerce is a hosted software, it comes with an included premium hosting with daily offsite backups, unlimited e-mails & top-notch security.

To sum up, the software offers more than anything a store owner can expect. It is a great choice for anyone who wants to run their stores without any technical hassle & get official support.

P.S. This post is a sponsored review.

Well, yes. After the first post published at WebResourcesDepot, at least one new resource is shared everyday with no exceptions and here is the 1000th post.

Although there are more to share in our bookmarks & your suggestions eases finding new ones, it is a good idea to give a small break and celebrate this with a huge giveaway.

Before introducing the details of the giveaway, a big thanks to everyone who follow WebResourcesDepot via:

• webresourcesdepot.com
• RSS
• Twitter

or any other media and contributes with their comments that help us all to learn more & improve ourselves.

Also, thanks very much to all the advertisers who support WRD.

The Huge Giveaway:

Here are the products/services which make this huge giveaway (32 products) possible (listed alphabetically):

• activeCollab
• CAZE
• CometChat
• Flowplayer
• MachForm
• MailChimp
• Monoslideshow
• Navicat
  
• Pingdom
• PointBanner
• SSLmatic

Read the rest of this entry »

Last week, a post at WRD was announcing the giveaway of MySQL tools by Webyog:

• 3 SQLyog Enterprise – MySQL GUI ($99/each)
• 1 MONyog Unlimited Servers – MySQL Monitoring Tool ($999/value)

The winners are set, but before that, to remember:

What is SQLyog?

It is a powerful MySQL manager and admin tool that makes controlling multiple databases so easy with features like:

• query profiler
• visual query & schema designer
• scheduled backups
• data synchronization
• HTTP(s) & SSH tunneling

besides the standard database management functions the application offers.

SQLyog MySQL GUI uses the native MySQL C API for the fastest communication with servers & offers a 100% keyboard-friendly usage.

What is MONyog?

It is a very well-thought software to help MySQL DBAs manage more MySQL servers, tune MySQL servers and fix problems with their MySQL database applications before they can become serious problems.

It is installed on any computer & monitors MySQL servers remotely.

With amazing features like:

• history/trend analysis
• quick performance tuning & optimization
• analysing slow query logs
• MySQL hacking attempts detection

MONyog is a time-saver & must-have for every database administrator.

And, the winners:

• Mario (comment #68870 – SQLyog)
• Anthony (comment #68566 – SQLyog)
• Eiskalter Engel (comment #70021 – SQLyog)
• Charca (comment #68823 – MONyog)

Congratulations to winners & thanks to everyone for contributing. To checkout the great softwares Webyog offers, click here.